


the wonders of christmas (wondering never got you anywhere)

by sukkerspinn



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, hook is there but he's obvs not doing any good, how does tags work, it's mostly about emma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 12:13:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11126781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sukkerspinn/pseuds/sukkerspinn
Summary: His hand is too rough and his hair doesn’t smell like apples. He doesn’t send her small smiles and roll his eyes when Snow comes up with yet another family bonding idea (that everyone weirdly enough never has the time for)But he kisses her cheek every time before he leaves, and he picks up hamburgers from Granny’s when she works late and it’s nice and safe and more than she’s had before and it should be enough. It is enough, it must be enough.





	the wonders of christmas (wondering never got you anywhere)

**Author's Note:**

> this is my very first fic! so it's probably not very good, seeing as I haven't written anything that is not a uni assignment (and in english) in three years. but I love these two, even if I haven't watched the show since season 2 (which is probably why I still love them)
> 
> so there's definitely room for improvment, but i thought 'hey, i wrote it, so i might as well post it' and maybe someone will read it, and maybe even enjoy it <3 
> 
> much love!

His hand is too rough and his hair doesn’t smell like apples. He doesn’t send her small smiles and roll his eyes when Snow comes up with yet another family bonding idea (that everyone weirdly enough never has the time for)

But he kisses her cheek every time before he leaves, and he picks up hamburgers from Granny’s when she works late and it’s nice and safe and more than she’s had before and it should be enough. It is enough, it must be enough.

She has invested so much into this, in him. She has literally gone to hell and back. But not just her and maybe that’s the main reason why she wants so hard. Because of him, because of her choice of him, her whole family has paid the price. Because magic always comes with a price, and why should the magic of true love be any different?

Because that’s what this is right? That’s what they have together, she and him. Sure, they’re nothing like her mother and father, but there are more ways to be in love than “I’ll always find you” and bold declarations of affections. They don’t have that, but they have other things.

Like movie nights, where they always watch an action movie, because romance is silly (even if The Notebook and a good cry sometimes is all she needs after a hard day). They go on dates to Storybrooke’s finest sea-food restaurant (she only ever eats the salad, because all fish make her feel bad after the months on the Jolly Roger).

It shouldn’t matter that the notes saying, “Do remember that paperwork today” or the seldom “Have a nice day, Miss Swan” that always accompany the extra lunch Regina sometimes sends for her with Henry makes her heart flutter (she never had anyone make lunch for her before, and it still feels weird that someone cares whether she eats or not). Or that the memory of the warm feeling she gets in her chest when they do the dishes after their weekly family dinner while listening to that dead boring classical music is the only things that gets her through some work days (the domesticity of it makes her throat constrict, and she tries not to feel too comfortable. But when their hips bump and Regina scowls when she flings soap suds after her, it’s easy to forget).

So what if she sometimes wonders if she ever looks at Hook the same way her mother looks at her father, with nothing but love and trust in her eyes. Because that’s not a Snow and David thing, that’s simply love, and that’s how one should look at their partner. And she wonders and wonders, and then wonder why she has to wonder, and she doesn’t know and maybe she shouldn’t think too much about it. Because even though she tells herself true love is real and that they have it, it’s always just been a dream for her.

And she was a dreamer whose dreams never came true and although that hopeful little girl may exist somewhere inside her, the girl that’s learned to take what she gets, and hold onto it hard because nothing ever lasts and good things only comes to good girls (and that’s definitely not her) is who she’s become.

So dreams remain dreams, only fleetingly existing in hidden moments, in the pause between two heartbeats when her eyes meets soft brown ones, and something that must remain unnamed passes between them.

Time passes, as time does. She tries suggesting Titanic for movie night, and when Hook finally realizes she’s not kidding, he shrugs his shoulders and falls asleep twenty minutes in. She catches him looking towards the sea sometimes and while she still agrees to seafood, she can’t get herself to say yes when he asks if she wants to go sailing with him. She’s been having a few large cases in a row and her days stretch out. Hook stops waiting for her with take-out after a while and is already in bed most of the time she comes home, his breath smelling faintly of alcohol when she slips in beside him.

She starts lingering at Mifflin after the family dinners, making up lame excuses like being unable to move because all the lasagna consumed, or offering to oil all the doors in the mansion. Regina doesn’t question it, but she gets a pained look sometimes, like she wants to say no, but can’t bear it. It hurts, but she can’t help it, can’t keep away. Lately it’s the only place she’s been able to really relax, and she revels in every second, knowing she’ll eventually have to go back to her apartment where her shoulders are tense and she doesn’t know why (it may have something to do with the whiskey on the table, the dishes in the sink, and the turned back she’s meet with in the bedroom, but she doesn’t want to think about that).

She doesn’t sleep as much, and Snow keeps asking if everything is okay. Which it is of course, why wouldn’t it be? (She buys a better concealer for her under eye bags, and Snow seems much happier the next time she sees her). Her inability to sleep makes for an opportunity to take up again her morning jogs, and so she gets up every morning before the sun, slips on her shoes, and starts to run. She runs until her lungs hurt, runs until her heart aches, run until there’s nothing left in her brain but the need for air. She runs, and summer turns to fall. The cold sets in, the pavement turns slippery with ice and one morning she wakes up to snow. She buys spikes for her shoes, puts on a hat and gloves and continues to run, and Hooks asks her why, why in the world she still bothers (what he doesn’t get, and she doesn’t know how to say, is how can she not run? That she doesn’t notice the cold, because she always feels cold now. How can she explain, that if she stops now, if she stops running, she doesn’t know if she’ll ever move again, and that scares her more than frostbite).

Christmas is nearing, so she tries to step it up, to get in the holiday spirit. She decorates their apartment, goes sleighing with Neal and Henry, drinks cocoa at Granny’s with her parents. She helps Regina put togheter the annual holiday feast for the town, and when the day comes and Regina shows up in a sleek black dress, a red santa hat and fake freckles on her cheeks, her whole body aches. And it’s not fair, to anyone, and it makes her so angry and so sad, because she should be happy, so so happy. Her whole family is here, she has more than that orphan girl could ever dream of and wanting more is so ungrateful, so unrealistic. But every time she hears Regina’s laugh drift across the room, every time she sees her smile, she wants to rip herself away from Hook and sprint over to her.

She stopped making Christmas wishes a long time ago when she realised they were never going to come true, but if someone had asked her to make a list right then and there, it would be one word long, and she’d wish and wish and wish.

In a quiet moment she finds her, sipping some punch in a corner, watching Henry, their almost- grown up son, dance with a girl on the dancefloor. She slips a comment about how maybe she should’ve donned her full sheriffs uniform, gun and all, and the small chuckle she gets in response fills her up with more Christmas joy than anything she’s done this December. Their eyes meet then, and her blood is rushing in her ears. She feels herself get lost in the warmth of those brown eyes, a whole universe blinking into existence within them, and she wonders and wonders, and her heart is beating louder than ever before and suddenly it feels like all the air in her lungs is being sucked out. She mumbles an excuse, before she quietly slips out, avoiding Hook and her parents, and then she starts to run.

She runs and runs, and the cold air rushes through her lungs, making them burn. She runs all the way to the beach where her body forces her to stop and she collapses on a bench, heaving for air. Her nose runs and when she touches her cheeks she realises they’re wet with tears. She tries convincing herself it’s only because of the cold, but she knows that’s a huge fat lie (like a lot of things in her life lately)

She wants to rage, wants to punch something, wants to continue running, wants to dive in the ice cold ocean just to feel _something_ that isn’t aching or guilt or failure. She knows she’s being selfish, and she’s so mad but she can’t stop thinking what if, what if it was Regina’s arm around her at that party, what if it was them putting up a huge Christmas tree in the mansion, decorating it with Henry’s homemade ornaments, what if she could make Regina smile every day, instead of the sad eyes she sometimes catches when she looks at her.

Her breathing has calmed down, and she takes a deep breath, clearing her nose. She can feel the cold start to set in, and realises she’s probably been here for a while. She wraps her arms around herself, starting to feel kind of stupid when she hears the clicking of heels to her right. She raises her head, finding Regina with her coat over her arm, searching her face, which probably looks like a mess. She drapes the coat over her shoulders, before sitting down beside her, hands in her lap. Emma clears her throat, rubbing her hands together.   

“Hi” she says weakly. “I just…you know, needed some air”

She forces a laugh, hoping Regina will just let it pass, let it slide like they always do (no, like she always does, when she laughs away Regina’s inquiries of her sleeping habits, when she ignores every worried look directed towards her, when she flees whenever Regina rests her hand on Emma’s and looks at her with those big eyes, asking if she’s okay. Regina doesn’t let anything slide)

“Emma” she says, and her voice is so soft, so worried, it cracks her poorly built shield in half and suddenly her eyes are filling up again, her throat constricting and all her feelings are welling up, forcing themselves into the air. A deep sobs rips through her and she’s crying, tears streaming down her cheeks and she’s so, so tired. She hangs her head not wanting Regina to see her like this, but not having it in her to hold it back anymore. Then she feels warm arms wrap around her and she falls into them, finally letting go, revelling in how protected she feels and wonders how this woman makes her feel more at home then she’s ever felt before. Then she wonders, how stupid she must be, if she lets this slip away from her. She thinks about all she’s lost, all she’s missed, all she never got, and almost everything in her screams no. All but that little girl, who finally gained a family, who finally felt like she belonged, the dreamer, whose dream of finally feeling happy may be closer than ever before. She’s whispering  _yes._

 

 


End file.
